Psychedelics for Mental Health: Help or Hype?

Open to Debate

Education, Society & Culture, News, Government, Politics

4.5 • 2.1K Ratings

🗓️ 13 December 2024

⏱️ 52 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Some scientific studies have shown evidence that psychedelic drugs, when used in controlled therapeutic settings, may help patients with their mental health — but should they be recommended by your doctor? Those advocating for psychedelic use argue that it could be a welcome relief for patients who don’t respond to traditional medicine. Those against its use argue we don’t yet understand their long-term effects. Now we debate: Psychedelics for Mental Health: Help or Hype? Arguing Help: Ismail Ali, Director of Policy and Advocacy at MAPS Arguing Hype: Kevin Sabet, President and CEO at the Foundation for Drug Policy Solutions Emmy award-winning journalist John Donvan moderates Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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0:31.1	This is open to debate. I'm John Donvan. Hi, everybody. Right now, it's not clear how decision
0:36.2	making at the Food and Drug Administration may change now that a new president will be putting new people in charge there.
0:42.9	This is something that's going to be closely watched by people who want to legitimize the use of psychedelic drugs as, well, as medications for conditions like depression and PTSD.
0:53.5	Consider drugs like LSD and MDMA, also known as ecstasy,
0:58.1	or psilocybin also known as magic mushrooms.
1:01.1	For most or all of the lifetimes of anybody listening,
1:04.6	these drugs have been considered fundamentally, let's say, illegal.
1:08.7	They've been categorized under Schedule 1 of the 1970 Controlled Substances Act,
1:13.0	which makes them basically illegal to manufacture or to sell or to use,
1:18.4	and that defines drugs like these as having currently no accepted medical use.
1:23.6	That's a quote.
1:24.9	Well, the FDA recently was asked to reconsider this and to reclassify
1:29.3	MDMA out of Schedule 1 and to make it available as part of a medical treatment for PTSD in
1:36.3	combination with traditional methods of therapy. The FDA looked at this and a few months back
1:41.5	it said no, but it said no, but go back and study it more, which may sound to some like, not yet, maybe we want to know more.
1:50.2	And that this left the door open to further reconsideration pending more data represents a potentially huge shift in what we might recognize these kinds of drugs to represent. And that excites some people
2:02.7	and it deeply concerns others. And that is the divide we're going to debate across in this episode,
2:08.1	in the understanding again that we don't know what change might be coming with new people in
2:11.3	charge at the FDA. The question in front of us for this episode is psychedelics for mental health,
2:19.1	health or hype.
	...

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